Stop 22: Gardner Hotel – 16 Roberts Street (Pivotal)
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This hotel was designed by the Hancock brothers and built in 1908. This is the most elaborate Classical Revival structure in downtown Fargo.
Note the paired bracketed metal cornice and foliated metal frieze, the brick quoins at the corners of the walls, the stone balustrade over the Roberts Street entrance, the egg and dart trim at the tops of the corner piers above the first story, and the stylized Corinthian capitols at the tops of the pilasters.
The hotel was completely financed, planned, built and furnished by Fargoans, and its original cost was $150,000. It catered to “drummers,” salesmen who traveled throughout the nation in the early 20th century selling their products. The building had steam heat, a public dining room, a barbershop, and a billiard room.
Its illustrious guests included politicians Franklin Delano Roosevelt, William Jennings Bryan, and Robert LaFollette; entertainers Charlie Chaplin, Sophie Tucker, Will Rogers and Jack Dempsey; and businessman James J. Hill.